


Stages of Touch: Discovery

by autoschediastic



Series: Stages of Touch [1]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Bathing/Washing, First Meetings, Getting Together, M/M, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:40:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23227252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/autoschediastic/pseuds/autoschediastic
Summary: Geralt longs for solitude, Jaskier longs for legends. One gets what he wants, the other what he needs.Geralt glances at Roach as if she has some advice on dealing with a benignly-addled bard. She offers her usual snorting judgement about his life choices and carries on nibbling at flowers. He takes a long, slow drink from his skin and weighs over a half century of experience against Jaskier’s inexplicable determination to stick close. "Are you trying to ask me for a fuck?"
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: Stages of Touch [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1670053
Comments: 43
Kudos: 761





	Stages of Touch: Discovery

**Author's Note:**

> Again, thanks to [katherine_tag](https://archiveofourown.org/users/katherine_tag/pseuds/katherine_tag) for being amazing in all ways.
> 
> This is a mix of Netflix, game, and book canon cherry-picked for my own enjoyment. Part One of three-part series Stages of Touch, a not-friends to fuckbuddies to lovers self-indulgent feels fest.

*

The sun shining brightly on the edges of a pale blue sky warms Geralt’s back. Quietly rushing water carries the rich scent of green growing things, a soft babble that eases the tension in his shoulders. After a night spent in Upper Posada’s noisy, stuffy inn, the early morning air is refreshingly light, filled with the happy twitter of birds and lowing of cows in need of milking.

“Geralt!” Jaskier hollers from the rope bridge strung between the tavern and bathhouse. “Geralt, you rapscallion, wait for me!”

“No,” Geralt mutters, ignoring Jaskier’s stomping boots and discordant twanging to saddle Roach. She flicks an ear at him. “I am hurrying, but you’re not helping.” He tugs on the cinch and gently nudges her barrel with an elbow. She puffs out a sulky breath so he can tighten it properly. “Thank you.”

Geralt mounts up just as Jaskier careens down the stairs and lands in a puff of dust. He springs to his feet, beaming with enthusiasm. “There you are,” he says, smacking dirt from his doublet. “Good morning!”

Roach snorts irritably. She delicately sidesteps and heads for the main road west without Geralt’s prompting.

“So!” Jaskier claps his hands and whips about to follow. “To what adventure do we march today? Ancient fiend-infested cursed battlegrounds? Dank and dreary swamps home to loathsome beasts? Vile and twisted--”

“I’m going to Gulet,” Geralt says, quickly cutting short Jaskier’s impending caterwauling. In the immediate silence that follows, he frowns. He isn’t in the habit of hiding his travel plans when he bothers to have them, but he definitely didn’t mean to let that slip so carelessly. “I don’t care where you’re going,” he adds gruffly. 

Yesterday when he set out for Posada’s so-called devil he thought the bard would grow bored and fuck off within a few hours, or else come face to face with some minor horror to the same result. The inevitable exhaustion from a beating, hours of walking, and non-stop running at the mouth should’ve been more than enough to convince Jaskier to leave him be. 

The evening found him reluctantly impressed by the bard’s resilience. Plagued every minute of every hour by endless chatter he decided a full night’s rest in a soft bed was worth the hassle of dealing with it in the morning. With Jaskier on foot he’ll need to put up with it for another half hour or so before the road climbs out of the more dangerous lowlands, then he can push Roach into a gallop that’ll leave the bard far behind. 

“Gulet sounds lovely,” Jaskier says, oblivious. “What’s in Gulet?”

“It’s what isn’t in Gulet.”

“Alright, what _isn’t_ in Gulet?”

“You.”

“And so they’ll celebrate my arrival!” laughs Jaskier breathlessly. “D’you mind slowing down a tad? You’ve got four legs and I’ve only got the two, and truth be told I’m a bit tired from yesterday. I know I don’t look it! It’s my youthful glow, you see, and--“ 

Geralt covers his face with one hand, fingers digging in at the corners of his eyes. All he’d wanted when he woke this morning was the blessed solitude of the road. Freedom for a time from the stinking din of humanity, the cloying weight of their wants and needs and desires. Jaskier is bursting with all of that and more, and now he’s without even the comfort of drink to dull it. 

“D’you have a headache?” Jaskier asks, sounding genuinely concerned. He rests a comforting hand on Geralt’s thigh, completely unperturbed by a low warning growl. “Your lovely face did take quite a beating. I bet she was jealous! Does that happen often?

“I have some powders if you’d like. Don’t look at me like that, not that nasty stuff! Entertaining all night takes its toll,” he natters on, rooting around in a mid-sized satchel that contains all his worldly possessions, which Geralt knows courtesy of his rambling includes several notebooks, a precious Dwarven lead pencil, half-used bottles of sticky ink and ragged quills kept more for sentimental value than practical use, but no hunting tools, camping equipment, or even food beyond the mint leaves he chews religiously after every meal. 

“Here we are!” he declares triumphantly, producing a small dented tin with an overdramatic flourish. “From the finest apothecary in the great Free City, guaranteed to soothe all your witcherly ails.”

“Will it render you mute?”

A brief, confused silence. “No? No. No, of course not. Why are you worried about losing your voice, it’s not like you… use it...” Another too-brief silence, then Jaskier chortles, “Oh, _you_ ,” and pushes the tin into Geralt’s loose grip on the reins. “Sour of face, sharp of wit! I can work wonders with that. Imagine disarming your detractors with unexpected nobility _and_ a fine sense of humour…”

Curiously, Geralt sniffs at the powder. It’s a common mixture of powdered bark and seeds, no more effective than the enhanced painkillers produced by his altered body chemistry. Given Jaskier’s manic personality, he’d expected an opiate of some sort. 

Jaskier peers up at him expectantly. If the bard had a tail he’d fall over from its furious wagging.

“I don’t have a headache,” Geralt says, tossing the tin negligently aside. 

Jaskier scrambles to catch it. “Well,” he huffs, “you could’ve said.” 

Blessed silence falls while he sulks. 

It lasts all of a hundred paces.

Two hours later and long after they’ve started the climb out of the Dol Blathanna region, Geralt guides Roach to where a small mountain stream flows towards the Dyphne river. She’s irritated it took him so long to stop for a drink, snorting at his attempted apology of scratching beneath her bridle. The day is clear, the road solid and safe, and still he hasn’t shaken the bard loose. It’s more than a half day’s ride to the crossroads at this pace, so there’s time yet to leave Jaskier behind. No need to hurry, but less reason to delay. 

Somehow Jaskier keeps babbling happily even as he collapses theatrically onto the grassy bank, smelling lightly of sweat with his doublet flapping open.

“You’re an only child,” Geralt says, down on a knee to fill his water skin.

Jaskier trails off mid-word. He blinks, frowns, draws a breath to speak; he lets it go again in a huff and shuffles around to sit up. Even when he isn’t talking he’s the noisiest person Geralt’s ever had the misfortune to meet. His face, screwed up in thought, suddenly smooths like the sea after a storm. “You _have_ been listening!”

“No,” Geralt says, turning his back on how Jaskier’s smile falters. “You just talk too much for a sibling to get a word in edgewise.” Without quite knowing why--maybe to reward his momentary quiet--Geralt offers a bit of dried meat from his pack. “Even a sister would’ve murdered you by now.”

Jaskier laughs for the hundredth time that morning. “A point for your witcher’s intuition. What about you, any comely sisters I should not be caught with on pain of death?” He gnaws on the tough jerky jammed between his molars, one eye scrunched shut.

“No.”

“Brothers? A brother, at least one,” Jaskier says, pointing with half-eaten meat. “You sound intimately familiar with the pitfalls of siblinghood.”

Geralt settles into an easy squat with a tree at his back, one eye on Roach cropping at a fern and the other on a rustle in the bush. In a way the boys of Kaer Morhen were his brothers. Those who survived to become men are the closest he’ll ever have to family, but they all walk the Path alone. 

Undaunted by Geralt’s heavy silence, Jaskier eagerly scoots close. “Are you the revered eldest or the cherished youngest? I would’ve guessed you were a quiet, studious boy, but ah ha, you’ve already shown your sly humour so I’m on to you now. D’you look alike, like a great muscly all-you-can-eat buffet?” 

Geralt rubs at his chin. Conversation might not be something he frequently has but even he knows asking after age and family is common enough. It’s been a long time since he was bothered by not knowing his birthday or his given name, let alone by not knowing those of his makeshift ‘family’. He strangely finds himself about to admit he doesn’t know when Jaskier’s exact words register. “A muscly what.”

“You know,” Jaskier says, eyes bright as he waves a hand Geralt’s way, “striking jawlines, big broad shoulders, an ass so tight men hate to see you leave and women love to watch you go.”

Geralt glances at Roach as if she has some advice on dealing with a benignly-addled bard. She offers her usual snorting judgement about his life choices and carries on nibbling at flowers. He takes a long, slow drink from his skin and weighs over a half century of experience against Jaskier’s inexplicable determination to stick close. “Are you trying to ask me for a fuck?”

Jaskier’s mouth drops open. A few choked-off noises gurgle in his throat as a flush spreads across his cheeks to the tips of his ears. “No?” he says, then when Geralt’s mouth goes flat, “yes? Well, no, I wasn’t.” He slaps a hand to his chest. “But I wouldn’t say no! If you were the one doing the asking. Not that I _wouldn’t_ ask-- would you like me to ask?”

“Alright,” Geralt says, capping his skin as he stands. “Come here and ask.”

Jaskier clambers to his feet, precious lute forgotten on the grass. He runs his hands quickly through his hair and tugs at his sleeves. Geralt crosses his arms as he fusses. This sort of foolishness should be annoying.

He’s oddly pleased when Jaskier stops just out of reach. “You’re not going to punch me again, are you?”

Geralt wonders at the smile he can feel tugging at his mouth. “No.”

“I don’t know if I believe you,” Jaskier says, crossing his arms to mirror Geralt.

Geralt shrugs.

Jaskier glances at Roach, the stream, the small path they followed to it. He huffs, evidently not finding whatever he was looking for. “I’m going to be very upset if you punch me,” he warns.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Geralt says, taking hold of the back of his neck once he’s close enough. He’s breathing fast already, his heartbeat as loud and quick as when Geralt had come around to find them roped together back to back in the dirt. He sways closer still when Geralt’s hand slides into his hair. A small tug has bright blue eyes flashing wide. His breath catches as Geralt noses across his jaw and close to the heat just below his ear. Geralt draws deep of his scent, noting the traces of cheap wine and cheaper soap as he shivers. 

“I like kissing,” Jaskier says inanely, his hands fluttering from Geralt’s chest to his waist, grip light and uncertain. “D’you like kissing? Are you going to kiss me, Geralt, because I very much want you to if that’s a thing you do.”

Geralt considers the benefits of a mid-day tumble. They’re in a decent spot for it, with plenty of soft grass and a conveniently-placed stream, and far enough back from the road they won’t be interrupted. Jaskier is easier to look at than he is to listen to, and despite the blushing and squirming Geralt doubts he’d be shy in bed. His fidgeting is even sort of nice, like it didn’t occur to him to hide his eagerness. Geralt might not be human but he is a man. What man doesn’t appreciate a little honest enthusiasm?

Jaskier’s lips are plush and soft, parting easily on a breath. He tastes only vaguely of warm mint and moans freely at the push of Geralt’s tongue. The way Jaskier carries on had somehow made Geralt forget they’re so close in height; it isn’t something he really thinks about when deciding to sleep with someone or not but finds he likes it, especially when Jaskier pushes him back against the tree, their bodies pressed tightly together from chest to thigh.

Jaskier makes a small sound of surprise and turns abruptly greedy, biting and sucking at Geralt’s lip, shoving his tongue into Geralt’s mouth. He tangles his fingers in Geralt’s hair, boldly twists up a handful and tugs. Hard. Geralt’s breath barely catches and yet Jaskier--careless, heedless, _oblivious_ Jaskier--hears the pleasure in it and pushes closer, hands and mouth rough. It’s overwhelming in a way Geralt hasn’t felt for decades, heady like the first time he slid between soft perfumed thighs, stealing his sense like the last of his Trials. 

The Chaos bored into his bones stirs. Great reaching fingers of it slide through his flesh. Its strength is dizzying; without Jaskier pinning him to the tree his buckling knees would’ve sent them both sprawling. 

Jaskier twists free, wide-eyed and chest heaving. His hand flies to his mouth as he stumbles back half a step. The thing that makes Geralt what he is--the thing forced into every part of him, burrowing its hooks into pain-carved paths--seethes at the loss. He grits his teeth against a pathetic whine.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Jaskier rasps.

*

The sun sits low on the horizon, the last light of day filtering brightly through the grove as Jaskier sits and stares at nothing at all. He’s vaguely aware of the crackling fire and the smell of roasting meat. It’s been at least an hour since his mouth started to feel normal again. His lips are sore from the constant scrape of his teeth.

On the other side of the fire, Geralt tests the edge of his blade before setting whetstone to steel again. He’s been smoothing out burrs in this vaguely threatening way for the last fifteen minutes.

“Do you go around all,” Jaskier starts, voice cracking; he swallows against the lump in his throat when Geralt’s dark gold eyes lift, “...buzzy like that all the time?”

Low and growling, Geralt says, “No.”

While Jaskier might be young and fresh to the life of a travelling troubadour, he’s not an idiot. He keeps his eyes and ears open; opportunity can strike in the strangest of places, as his newfound companion proves.

It so happens that whores are his favourite audience--they’re pretty and smell nice, appreciate a good time had by all, and always trade in the very best gossip--so he _knows_ witchers have a reputation for uncommon generosity between the sheets. What he doesn’t know is how out of the dozens of wenches and courtesans he’s met on his quest for fame and fortune not a single one had let slip that bollocks to skill and stamina, witchers have a _literal_ magic touch. 

Giving one a go at the butter churn must really be something to secure the secrecy of an entire profession. “How many lovers must be left in your wake ruined for any touch but yours. It boggles the mind.”

“It doesn’t happen with everyone,” Geralt says, as if that matters.

“Does it have anything to do with all those little tonics and tinctures? Here I was so worried that you thought I’d offered up a snort of White Death for your headache.”

Geralt grumbles deep in his chest, cranky as an arthritic hound. 

The grove Geralt sniffed out for their camp is about half a mile off the road, and it’s actually fairly cosy filled with the scent of their supper and Roach’s sleepy whuffles. Much better than the mud pit Jaskier slept in the last time he hit the road without a caravan. He’s proud of his contribution of wild tubers cooking away nestled in flame-heated rocks near the fire, even if Geralt got pissy when Jaskier suggested they’d taste better with a bit of cream and herbs rather than coarse salt. 

Jaskier settles a little lower against the crooked stump he’s using as a backrest, watching as the sunset’s warm glow slowly fades to cooler shadow on Geralt’s pale skin. Geralt’s mouth is set in a flat, tight line. Clearly he isn’t pleased by Jaskier’s scrunity, but he hasn’t told him to fuck off in almost four hours. 

“We part ways at Gulet,” Geralt says in his bristly way. 

“No can do,” Jaskier replies cheerily. “My masterpiece--the first of many, I assure you--depends on you, lovely witcher.” He tucks his hands behind his head and sighs gustily. This soft interlude will make an excellent bridge in the epic tale of the White Wolf.

“I don’t care.”

“Too bad, so sorry, but I promised. It is now my sworn duty to sway the hearts of the fickle masses to your noble calling. Besides that,” he adds, smiling his most charming smile, “we were in the middle of something.”

The whetstone falls silent. “You stopped,” Geralt says, not lifting his eyes.

“I was surprised!” Jaskier sits bolt upright. “You can’t seriously blame me for being caught off guard when you started shoving _magic_ into my mouth alongside your tongue.”

“Right,” Geralt snorts. 

“Well, that settles that.” Jaskier lifts his chin boldly. “I think you should come here.”

The one constant in Jaskier’s life aside from his music is his ability to read a crowd. Paired with his immeasurable talent and dedication, it’s why he’s destined to be the most famous bard of all time on the Continent and beyond. But Geralt is written in a language where tone and nuance are shifted, familiar yet not, and the look on his face when he finally meets Jaskier’s gaze is somewhere between intrigued and unimpressed, wary and a little wild.

Jaskier casually drapes an arm over a loose chunk of stump. “Up to you.”

Geralt makes that low noise deep in his throat, the one that can apparently mean anything from ‘yes, I agree’ to ‘die shitting yourself’. Jaskier is fairly certain it falls more towards the former in this particular instance. 

“If you want to make it a battle of wills, let me save you the trouble,” Jaskier says brightly. “I’ll lose spectacularly.”

Geralt smirks, smug and self-satisfied; two day’s acquaintance and he’s already figured that much out. Eerily silent without even a creak of leather or cottony rustle, he gracefully rises from sitting cross-legged on the ground. He isn’t built much differently from the average career soldier--less thick about the middle and finer formed in every way, like he was carved from clay rather than birthed flesh and blood--but clearly not the hulking, warped perversion of humanity rumour insists. Even the most refined of those men could never move the way Geralt does, lithe and light-footed as he circles the fire and sinks down into an easy crouch.

The smirk coupled with how unfairly relaxed Geralt is when his own belly is full of frantic fluttering pushes his ballsy daring over the edge to outright foolish recklessness. Eyes fixed on Geralt’s face, he takes hold of Geralt’s arm and tugs his worn leather glove off finger by finger. Despite having had Geralt’s tongue in his mouth this is what feels like taking liberties. 

The witcher did say not everyone felt what Jaskier had. Maybe he’s curious, too. 

Jaskier drops the glove and leaves his fingertips hovering just above Geralt’s palm close enough to feel the heat of his skin but not to touch. It had taken a few moments for the tingling to start when they kissed. Will it be the same again? Or now that he’s felt it once will the sensation be immediate, like his body’s become attuned to the energies hidden inside Geralt? Even if it’s rare, Geralt must know. He could ask. Prepare himself. 

His hand is slender and smooth beside Geralt’s scarred, wide-palmed one. More than once someone’s been surprised by the strength in Jaskier’s grip--as if hours upon hours of lute-playing were _easy_ \--and for as pale and callused and thick as Geralt’s fingers are, his hand is as deceptive as Jaskier’s. It’s warm and gentle when Jaskier decisively laces their fingers together, almost enfolds Jaskier’s completely in a way that feels safe, honest. 

Almost at once a strange humming like a struck but soundless string spreads from their clasped hands, sinks slowly through skin to muscle. Just past his wrist it fades to nothing. He’d wrenched away too soon before to notice much beyond that first tingle, and as he holds tight to Geralt’s hand it begins to feel a little like the itchy ache of a healing cut, his skin pulled tight and heated, and overwhelmingly like the dizzying pleasure of a long slow stretch of cramped muscle. His blood is a loud rush in his head. His mouth, his throat, are suddenly dry. 

“Can you feel that?” Jaskiers asks, soft with wonder as his skin prickles with goosebumps. 

Geralt lifts a single eyebrow. “That your hand is weak and soft as a newborn’s? Yes.”

“You _know_ that’s not what I meant.” Jaskier flexes his fingers. The physical sensation of skin rubbing against skin is strangely unmuted. His sense of touch is completely separate.

Geralt makes that low throaty hum again, a sound for all intents and purposes absolutely meaningless and entirely frustrating. If Jaskier talks too much, Geralt doesn’t talk nearly as much as he should. How is he expected to figure out from umpteen only slightly varying intonations of _hm_ what Geralt’s saying?

Thoroughly annoyed by the lack of communication--and by his own shallow, ragged breaths; what is he, a schoolboy in shortpants hiding behind a barn?--Jaskier decides it means he can do as he likes until clearly informed otherwise. Lifting Geralt’s hand he presses a courtly kiss to the back of it, and when that garners no reaction he kisses each of Geralt’s knuckles slow and open-mouthed with a hint of tongue.

The heady tingling remains steady on the thin, delicate skin of his lips, further proof that however his body translates the touch of Geralt’s magic, it isn’t through something as mundane as nerves.

Eyes closed, Jaskier brushes his lips along Geralt’s finger to learn its texture. At the fingertip he pauses for a kiss and Geralt finally lets loose a small, surprised grunt. Refusing to think about why Geralt wouldn’t expect a seduction so simple even horny teenagers and tired housewives manage to come up with it, he takes Geralt’s finger onto his tongue, closes his mouth around it and sucks.

This time Geralt grunts like Jaskier punched _him_ in the gut. 

Jaskier grins as the warm tingling spreads through his mouth with the salt of Geralt’s skin. His teeth graze a knuckle as Geralt’s other fingers curl under his chin and tilt his face up, thumb light against his cheek. He bites playfully, maybe a little harder than he would if Geralt were less of an ass, and revels in the hiss of Geralt’s breath. 

Geralt pins his tongue as he licks at the fading taste of salt. Shamefully dizzied already, Jaskier opens his mouth to the pressure, spit rubbed deliberately over his lips Geralt’s finger slips free. Jaskier catches his wrist before he gets too far away, teeth scraping again at his tongue as the achy tingling lingers. 

“It’s not fair _at all_ if you can’t feel that,” Jaskier says, finally opening his eyes. The sun’s finally sunk below the horizon to leave their grove in deep shadows and flickering firelight. What was comfortably casual and cosy a few minutes ago now feels overly close, intimate. 

In much the same way Geralt’s grumpy, rumbly voice is exactly as it’s been since they met but sounds entirely different when he says, “I can feel it,” and reclaims his hand entirely. “Not like you do, but I feel it.”

“How do you know that?” Jaskier asks, worrying at his lips; the feeling is taking much longer to fade this time. “What does it feel like?”

Maddeningly, Geralt just goes, “Hm,” looking at his fingers as he rubs them together. 

“Geralt?”

“Food’s ready,” Geralt says, rising. “Eat what you can before I do.”

Jaskier scrambles up on his knees, jabbing a finger at Geralt’s back. “Those ugly little potatoes are _mine_. And I don’t think I want to share!”

Geralt helps himself to some anyway.

“You’re a dick,” Jaskier says, crossing his arms and sitting back on his heels. “ _Without_ balls.”

*

Geralt arrives in Gulet late in the afternoon three days later. He allowed two more nights in shared company, making sure the companion he bore no responsibility toward was fed and sheltered, and left before dawn without guilt. The meat tucked into Jaskier’s pack will last long enough to reach town even at his dawdling pace. And by the time he does, Geralt will either be out on a contract or headed to the next likely place to find one. 

He clucks his tongue at Roach, directing her to the inn where the notice board was last time he passed this way. Two streets away the crowd grows so tight it’s easier to push through on foot. 

“No market today,” Geralt says to Roach, frowning. The roads would’ve been much busier. From afar Gulet hadn’t looked large enough to support this kind of press. 

The street right in front of the Hedgerrap Inn is the busiest but the din is oddly muted. Geralt scowls at the opportunistic food vendors and pickpockets relieving people of their coin. Catching one of the latter by the scruff, Geralt growls, “Best not to. Tell me what’s--“

“Oh gods, it’s him!” the wiry youth yowls. “It’s the wolf witcher!”

Over the droning buzz that follows floats the sound of a lute and a familiar voice. 

“No,” Geralt snarls, dropping the thief and shoving to the front. He hitches Roach’s reins to a wooden post, warns the lot to keep their distance with a murderous glare, then storms into the commons.

“Geralt!” Jaskier cries from where he stands atop a table. “My friends, please welcome and make way for the noble witcher and my glorious muse, the great Geralt of Rivia!”

There’s a scattering of table-thumping boot-stomping that quickly dies when Jaskier strikes a chord. He lets it hang in the air for a long moment before strumming another, taking the time between that and the next to meet the gaze of every person crammed into the room.

Then he opens his mouth to sing. 

Later, when Geralt is on his fourth beer and seventh contract proposal, a hoarse and elated Jaskier takes his final bow. 

“Are ye sure, master witcher?” asks the grandfather sitting across from Geralt, holding out a few dull coins. “I’ve no worries ye won’t be worth it.”

“It’s fine,” Geralt says. “Save your money for the herbalist. Burn the mix in a bear fat candle every night for a week. You’ll be free of the pest then.”

“Thankie, thankie very much indeed.” The man gets painfully to his feet, bowing his head. He drops a single coin onto the table, says, “For to wet your throat with all the talk,” and shuffles off. 

Sighing, Geralt pockets the coin. The old man would’ve gotten the same advice from anyone even remotely skilled in plant lore, probably from a neighbour if he bothered to ask. The night brought seven possible contracts, four with solutions so easy Geralt didn’t have to lift a finger, two that weren’t anything at all, and one with a real beast to slay and shit pay. 

Could be worse. 

On cue, Jaskier strolls on up and plunks his ass down beside Geralt’s on the low bench. “Business is booming, eh dear witcher? At this rate I’ll need to buy a larger purse!”

“How the fuck did you get here so fast?” 

“Aha, funny story!” Jaskier beams up at the young miss that brings over a flagon and a pitcher so full foam drips down the side. “When I woke to find you gone I was sure some nasty beastie had made itself known and you were off to do your witcherly duty. I admit it took some time for me to become concerned, but when there was neither hide nor hair of you for hours....” He drinks deeply, eyes closed in bliss. “Oh, that’s nice,” he says, wiping his mouth. “We need a bit of cheese with this, don’t you think? Myrien, oh sweet lady, bring us a bite to eat!”

“ _Jaskier_ ,” Geralt growls, yanking the bard halfway across the table.

“Oi, hey now.” Jaskier swats at the hand fisted in his doublet. “Geralt, you must know I was sick with worry when the kind lord Estafan stumbled upon me. Picture this: I stand sentinel on the desolate road, wracked with horror at the mere thought of you lost and hurt beyond my reach. But what am I to do? Loyal to my brave companion, I must keep my vigil. In the distance I hear the blessed sound of hoofbeats; my heart soars. But no, it’s not my White Wolf and his mighty steed.” He shakes his head and mournfully regards a chunk of cheese plucked from the platter delivered during his monologue. The girl, Myrien, stands with her hand at her chest and eyes swimming. “If dear Estafan’s mage hadn’t comforted me, I’m sure I’d still be there as desolate as the darkening sky.”

“A mage.” Trying to rub away a brewing headache, Geralt glances up from the table. “You were portalled here?”

“Only _after_ I concluded that if you were injured the faithful Roach would most likely carry you to the nearest town. And if not, it would be much easier to launch a search party from here. Sweet mercy, Geralt, I wouldn’t just _leave_ you.”

Someone pulls the mug from Geralt’s grasp. Myrien gives him a wobbly smile as she fills it. “Please eat, sir witcher,” she says, pressing it back into his hand. “Master Jaskier refused to until he knew you were safe.” To Geralt’s utter shock she leans close, close enough her breath is warm on the side of his face. “Such a delicate soul he is,” she murmurs. “Gentle your hands.”

Geralt frowns mightily as she bustles away, rounding up the gawkers and juggling mugs and plates and coin with the deft authority of a woman twice her age.

“I’m glad I was right,” Jaskier says, chewing happily. “What do you say we bring this all upstairs and you can regale me with the tale of whatever creature waylaid you?”

“Right,” Geralt says absently, staring at the far wall with his brows drawn tight.

Jaskier hops to his feet and starts gathering things up. Belting out, “Oh Valley of Plenty!” at the top of his lungs, he marches for the stairs. Geralt follows slightly dazed in his wake.

By the time they’re settled in the room Jaskier rented, the food gone along with most of the beer and Jaskier splashing away in a cramped tub, Geralt’s wits return. It’s been a very long time since anything’s surprised him let alone the sorts of things humans get up to. From the moment Jaskier sidled up to the table with bread in his damn pants he’s been nothing _but_ surprises. 

“Must’ve been bad, eh?” Jaskier says, sniffing at a bottle. “You’ve been more broody than usual.”

Geralt stops just short of snarling Jaskier has no idea what his usual is; the bard’s been hanging off his belt for less than a week. 

“S’alright,” Jaskier goes on, “you can tell me after you’ve rested. Here.” He stands up, water sloshing, and gropes for a towel. “Water’s still warm. You can wash up, relax. I’ll ring for more beer, shall I?”

The over-perfumed water is probably lukewarm at best. If there’s one thing in all of civilisation Geralt is weak to, though, it’s a bath. He isn’t bothered by road grime; a good rinse and soak in a stream or pond after a fight is more than sufficient for both his health and his nose. He can easily go weeks without a single thought given to proper bathing. But the bath is right there, and precious little in his world compares to being well and truly clean.

“Lots of beer,” Geralt says, shedding bits and pieces of leather like a tree dropping its leaves. The tub’s so small he can only fit one leg in along with the rest of him, the other left draped over the side. A small hand gesture sets the water steaming. He holds back a sigh as tension instantly eases.

With a final loud thud Jaskier’s thumping about comes to an end. Geralt cracks one eye open to see him sitting on the floor between the hearth and the tub, lute in his lap and a bed fur under his ass. His fingers stroke lightly over the strings. He wears one of his blousy chemises, neck and cuffs left unlaced, the hem loose about his thighs.

After a few chords he laughs ruefully, shaking out his hand. “Haven’t had a cramp since the old doffer in charge of second year took a dislike to me. Joke’s on him, punishing me with hours and hours of technical practice. Boring as shit and worth every second.”

“Form drills,” Geralt says with a nod. “Same thing.” A long moment of quiet follows. He regrets sharing even that small part of himself as it turns expectant. 

But instead of more questions, Jaskier says, “All professions are the same in the end. Practice, practice, practice.”

Wary, Geralt hums his agreement. 

“Are you going to stew in there all evening?”

Geralt grunts and switches legs, the left one dripping water onto the floor, the right erupting into gooseflesh from the heat.

“You should at least wash.”

“In a hurry, bard?”

“No. Not really. Maybe?” Jaskier makes a small noise of discontent. “I was hoping we could... It was quite nice, after all, I’d like to continue.” He clears his throat, rolls his eyes, and sets the lute aside. “Obviously.”

Geralt holds back a smile, offering instead a confused hum.

“Oh for-- Geralt, would you like to bed me?”

Letting the question hang long enough Jaskier starts to fidget and huff, Geralt says, “Sounds like a lot of work.”

“You-- I-- _What?_ ”

Geralt sits up, groping around the sides of the tub for the soap. “While I bed you, what are you going to do? Lie there? Moan prettily?” He shakes his head. Soap finally in hand he starts to scrub. 

Jaskier’s mouth works soundlessly. He makes a few aborted attempts at speaking before his mouth snaps shut. Indignant, he folds his arms. The hem of his shirt rides up to show a brief flash of rosy skin. “Oh, I see, I see. My proposition was far too polite. Let me think, I’m sure I can come up with something suitably colourful. Should I aim for sordid, lewd, or merely crass?”

This is why Geralt prefers to pay for his pleasure. A whore’s laugh might be as fake as their desire, but at least if his clumsy attempts at humour fall flat they’ll judge him for it after he’s gone. 

He sighs deeply. “I didn’t mean--“

“No, no.” Jaskier holds up a hand. “I’ve got it now.” He fusses with his shirt so it hangs rakishly off one shoulder and bares the opposite hip, then ruffles and smooths his hair in a way that leaves it looking exactly the same as when he started. “Ready? Ready.” He pauses dramatically. 

Geralt is strangely fascinated. 

“Witcher,” Jaskier says seriously, “get your ass on the bed so we can get to the fucking and sucking already.”

And Geralt would laugh, a true laugh straight from his belly, but the abrupt and forceful rush of blood to his cock steals his breath. Jaskier watches expectantly, an eyebrow raised and mouth twitching at the corner. 

“That was shit,” Geralt says, getting to his feet and stepping out of the tub in the same movement. It puts his cock perfectly level with Jaskier’s suddenly wide-eyed face. “But alright.”

Jaskier looks up, and up, and up again. “Wow, okay.” His tongue darts out to wet his lips as his gaze drops all the way back down. “I mean. Wow.”

“Sweet-talker.”

“I’d tell you exactly where you can put that smirk of yours except I’m frightfully more concerned about where you’re going to put _that_.” Climbing shakily to his feet--another flash of bare skin confirming that the chemise is all he’s wearing--Jaskier takes a slow step back. He covers his mouth with a hand. “You’re bloody magnificent.”

Geralt can’t help but silently preen. For all his freakishness he’s never had any complaints once his clothes come off.

“Where do we start?” Jaskier says, mostly to himself. “I don’t know where to start. Sweet Melitele, guide my hands.”

“Can’t figure that out on your own?”

“Oh no, yes. Yes, I most certainly can. There’s just so _much_ of you. Can I--?” Both of Jaskier’s hands come up to rest lightly on Geralt’s chest. He bites his lip as he traces Geralt’s collarbones, pushes his palms down over Geralt’s ribs to settle low on his hips. Bright spots of red colour Jaskier’s cheeks. He glances up almost shyly before curling his fingers inward. 

“I thought you wanted the bed,” Geralt says.

“I want everything,” Jaskier breathes. He looks pained as he lets his hands drop. “That’s a good idea, though. The bed. Go.”

On a quiet _hm_ , Geralt goes, stretching out with both pillows under his head. Jaskier waits for his full attention before tossing his shirt aside with flair, striking a brief pose. It should be ridiculous--it is, mostly--but it’s also oddly attractive. Jaskier’s lean body certainly is, and stripped of all his frippery, obviously male. Very male, very aroused, and very much a pleasure to watch approach. 

When he confidently straddles Geralt and bends low for a kiss, Geralt adds ‘very thoroughly appreciative’ to his mental accounting. 

Warmth slowly gathers where they touch. Jaskier’s hands are flighty, hardly in one place long enough for it to begin, but beneath his mouth and against his thighs Geralt’s skin comes alive.

Geralt wraps an arm around Jaskier to pull him closer, pushes at his hip with the other hand. Jaskier lets out a short confused sound, refusing to move.

“On top of me, damn it,” Geralt growls as best he can between Jaskier’s greedy wet kisses.

“Oh,” Jaskier says, and carefully settles down, slipping a little to the side, and “ _oh_ ,” again when Geralt moves him back so they’re pressed together in a long, unbroken line. His hips jerk away at first, too much of whatever he feels from the Chaos embedded in Geralt’s body, but cautiously come close again. His eyes squeeze shut.

Cowardly, all Geralt can do is say his name. The warmth has spread almost everywhere and with it the heightened sensation of touch. The mutations always include pain suppression of one type or more; the additional Trials he endured muted more than just pain. It wasn’t that he couldn’t feel, that wouldn’t be useful. But skin to skin with someone who stirred dormant magics, what normally registers as fact--pressure, texture, temperature--becomes so much more. Like the difference between knowing theoretically what a kiss is and actively experiencing one; it hardly compares. 

If Jaskier pulled away from him now--

“It’s alright,” Jaskier says, his face still a little scrunched up. “It was just... a lot all at once.”

Geralt risks bringing their mouths together again, gentler than Jaskier had. Jaskier’s breath hitches but he melts into it, even presses a bit closer. His cock is thick and wet at the head. Not just damp but truly wet, leaking, smearing messily against Geralt’s skin.

“Is that for me?” Geralt asks, taking hold of Jaskier’s cock to thumb at the slit. He gives it a few shallow pulls, squeezing when it jerks and thick precome beads up, spills over. 

“Dirty talk, of course,” Jaskier mutters, flushing a deeper red even as he nods. He gasps when Geralt starts to jerk him off in earnest. “Yes, fuck, it’s for you, don’t stop, _please_ don’t stop.”

“Or what,” Geralt teases. Blunt nails dug into his chest and shoulder. Stopping isn’t in any plan of his short of being told to--Jaskier _does_ moan prettily. Shivering at the touch of breath on his lips, he welcomes the scrape of teeth and rocks helplessly into Geralt’s grip, already so close to spilling. 

Geralt slows his hand; Jaskier groans raggedly. “Or what,” he presses. 

Jaskier opens dazed eyes. “Or-- or I won’t put your dick in my mouth. And I want to,” he says, catching his breath quickly. “I want to so badly, I can’t even imagine what it’ll be like, how you’ll taste, please get me off right the fuck now, Geralt, you‘re _incredibly_ good at it, pretty please with a fucking cherry on-- Yes, yes-- _Oh_.”

Even focused on every twitch, every sound, surprise washes hot through Geralt as Jaskier tenses, breath held, and comes. It happens so fast Geralt’s left feeling like he barely got to touch Jaskier at all. Spend covers his knuckles as Jaskier’s cock jerks in his grasp and Jaskier groans with every thick pulse, more and more spilling from him until Geralt’s hand is soaked in it. As Jaskier goes lax Geralt lifts his arm, turning his glistening hand in the firelight; come drips slowly down past his wrist. It’s impressive.

Jaskier laughs at his dumbfounded look. “It’s, ah, been a few days. Several, maybe? And you’re very sexy.”

Geralt snorts and wipes his hand on the patchwork quilt. 

“Enough about me!” Jaskier pushes back sweat-damp hair and sits up, rubs his hands together. “Let’s see what I can do with this.”

Tucking an arm under his head, Geralt spreads his bent knees, giving Jaskier room to brace himself on his elbow when he scoots in close. He stretches his fingers as if he’s about to play, tilting his head this way and that before wrapping a firm hand around Geralt’s cock. Geralt hums his approval.

A small wrinkle forms between Jaskier’s brows as he takes his time learning what Geralt likes, easily figuring out a few long, slow pulls prime him for more while working him closer to the root makes his cockhead leak. A few moments are even dedicated to playing with his sack. Generally that's something he can take or leave depending on his partner’s enjoyment but Jaskier’s touch is trapped lightning, electric. 

“Oh I like that,” Jaskier says in response to a moan caught and silenced deep in Geralt’s throat. He swallows tightly and brings his mouth close to the crown, eyes closing briefly as he breathes deep. Time drags impossibly slowly between wetting his lips and rubbing them brazenly over Geralt’s slit, back and forth and back and forth until they shine. As the taste slowly reaches Jaskier’s tongue he says, “ _Oh_ ,” again, his mouth soft and open.

When he takes Geralt’s cock into his mouth, careless with his teeth but his tongue eager, Geralt inhales sharply through his nose. Jaskier crams his mouth too full before he even tries to suck, and when he does he’s clumsy with it, easily distracted by the texture of Geralt’s cock against his tongue. His mouth goes loose when he finds the circumcision scar under the head, tonguing at it curiously and then with focus as Geralt thickens even more.

“Jaskier,” Geralt grits out, teeth clenched against what he’s now sure is an accidental unending tease. Jaskier makes a low noise to show he’s listening, which doesn’t help at all. “Jaskier, _come here_.”

Obviously reluctant, Jaskier lifts his head. He blinks blearily, most of his attention still on Geralt’s cock in his hand. His lips are wet and reddened, the bottom one caught between his teeth as his thumb finds that same spot. “Is this from-- because you’re a witcher?” He watches avidly as Geralt’s cock kicks slightly, more precome forced from the tip. “It’s very fetching.”

“Common practice at the time,” Geralt says, taking hold of Jaskier’s wrist to steady him. “Have you done this before?”

Impossibly, Jaskier flushes darker. “With, um. You mean my mouth? Yes. A little. _Why?_ If you’re about to impugn my talents--”

“That’s not it,” Geralt says seriously. “If you’re not--”

Abruptly Jaskier sits up and crosses his arms. “If I’m not _what_? I’ll have you know I was enjoying myself immensely until you interrupted to _insult_ me.”

Groaning, Geralt scrubs a hand over his face. “It was fine, Jaskier, I’m just asking--”

“Fine? _Fine?_ ”

“For fuck’s sake, you suck cock like a virgin whore, I only wanted to know if you needed... something. _Fuck_.”

“...ah.”

Geralt heaves a sigh. “Forget it. Just--”

“No. But yes?”

Geralt drops his hand and looks at Jaskier incredulously; he couldn’t mean for that to make sense. 

Jaskier throws himself onto the bed beside Geralt. “No, I don’t want to forget it. Yes, you’re right, I haven’t exactly done this specifically, in particular, before. I _have_ done lots of other things, I’m an incredibly virile man approaching his second decade armed with the… _What now?_ ”

Geralt is aware he has a skewed sense of time. Some years go by like weeks, weeks like days, days like hours. He’s seen more than he cares to remember and forgotten far less than he’d like. Everyone seems young to him, even those grey-haired and stooped with age. He has no business letting Jaskier into his life, let alone his bed. 

But Geralt isn’t a good man, or even a man at all. He’ll take this for himself, bear the guilt for his selfishness, and prove to Jaskier on the hunt tomorrow that hitching onto a witcher’s coattails will bring much worse things than a beating from a sick elf.

To Jaskier he says, “Watch your teeth.”

Jaskier pops into his field of vision, all tousled hair and bright eyes. “Really?”

“Yes, really. It fucking hurts.”

“Not what I meant!” Jaskier crows, wriggling madly around to get Geralt’s cock back in his face. “We’ll work on our communication later, hm? To more important matters!”

Abruptly reminded of other important matters--ones that might help him forget Jaskier’s soft, eager mouth in the morning--Geralt levers up on his elbows. “Where the fuck is the beer?”

*

The following morning finds Jaskier with a sore throat, an aching jaw, and what he’ll freely admit is an insufferable bounce in his step. It isn’t immediately noticeable--or noticable at all, really--but no matter how his short acquaintance with the witcher, he’s certain Geralt is not quite as grumpy as he’s been since Jaskier first laid eyes on him in Posada. Multiple orgasms do tend to have that effect on a man. 

They set off immediately on a hunt for some sort of mutant spider beast. Well, immediately after Geralt stopped trying to make him stay behind. Under strict orders to shut up, tread lightly, and obey Geralt’s every command--and considering the remote likelihood of containing his enthusiasm--he behaved rather admirably. He watched Geralt poke at the ground, sniff the air, mutter seemingly random conclusions, and finally stick his tongue into a strange glowing substance that Jaskier’s certain should not under any circumstances be consumed. Jaskier stood over Geralt demanding he rinse his mouth extremely thoroughly after that. 

All of this led some three hours later to Jaskier crouching behind a boulder far, _far_ away from the ferocious battle, wide-eyed and trying desperately to breath through his mouth without choking. Witnessing Geralt’s tracking skills had been moderately more satisfying if not exactly more exciting than being tied up while Geralt took a beating. Watching the savage poetry of him in battle is utterly captivating. Even unable to recognize Geralt’s technical prowess--the difference between a push through and a running in is completely lost on Jaskier--his control and command of his body is breathtaking.

Only because of last night does Jaskier experience the smallest, almost negligible tingle of arousal as Geralt, teeth bared in a triumphant snarl, rips his sword through the squishy bulbous abdomen of the revolting creature. He can’t help but flinch and duck even lower when it explodes into chunky bits of goo. 

Silence falls. 

Counting slowly to ten, he cautiously peers over the boulder. Then he stands, spotting Geralt knelt beside the corpse. The witcher seems uninjured. When he doesn’t start bellowing curses, Jaskier picks his way to the wreckage that was when they first arrived and aside from the meaty pile of rot that led Geralt here a very pleasant wooded area. 

“That,” Jaskier declares, “is very fucking ugly.”

“Stinks too,” Geralt agrees, carefully capping a painstakingly-collected vial of venom. He nonchalantly pulls out a wicked saw-toothed blade and sets about butchering the giant spider like a cow. Sawing at the head he starts to hum.

”Gods above,” Jaskier squeaks. 

A leg cracks and pops off in Geralt’s grip. He grunts, annoyed, and tosses it aside. Taking hold of another for leverage he goes back to his gruesome work. 

Jaskier, a hand clapped over his mouth, stumbles off into the bushes not sticky with venom and vomits spectacularly. 

“Ugh,” he declares with feeling. His wonderful free breakfast is decidedly less appealing on second appearance. He gropes for his water skin and rinses his mouth. The next village they wander into had better stock mint leaves if this is going to be a common occurrence. He was prepared for the messy slaying of hideous beasts but not so much for the harvesting of various parts and innards. Somehow the latter is far more repugnant. 

Jaskier makes his way back to the battlefield. Whatever’s left of the monster after Geralt’s slaughter is ablaze, stinking of burnt hair and sour milk. Jaskier holds a handkerchief over his mouth and nose and makes his way to Geralt’s side a fair distance from the flames. The various fluids spattering his armour smell slightly less worse than roasting arachas. 

Geralt slowly lifts one silent, judging eyebrow. 

“I’m perfectly fine, thank you for asking,” says Jaskier nasally. “What’re you going to do with all those... bits and pieces?”

“Sell them.” Geralt lifts his hand in a gesture. The fire reaching for fresh fuel off to the left curls back in on itself to leave the trees untouched. Venom-soaked shrubbery catches alight instead. 

“Huh,” Jaskier says. That witchers are created through alchemy and magic is common knowledge but he hadn’t considered that they could command it, too. It’s not a fact that needs publicizing. He’s here to improve Geralt’s public image, not give people another reason to fear him. 

“What other tricks do you have up your sleeves?” Jaskier asks.

“They’re not tricks,” Geralt growls. 

“Oh, sweet witcher.” Jaskier shakes his head sadly. “Everything’s a trick to those who don’t know how it’s done.”

For the first time that day Geralt turns to face him fully. He isn’t exactly scowling but he doesn’t look very happy either. His yellow-eyed stare is uncomfortably intense. A small, oft-ignored sense of self-preservation tells Jaskier to back away slowly, forget this handsome-faced witcher with dry humour and deadly grace. 

Even with the memory of Geralt’s kisses so fresh in his mind, for once he doesn’t dismiss the idea out of hand. 

“You’d be wise to find another travelling companion when we reach Asheberg,” Geralt says, turning his gaze back to the fire. 

Jaskier watches a blackened chunk of flesh fall from the twisted mass, break and scatter into ash. The fire burns hotter than anything natural. By the time it dies there’ll be nothing left but scorched earth. “I would,” he agrees.

He won’t. 

As he told Geralt, respect doesn’t make history. Neither does prudence make legends.

*

End

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on Twitter [@bluesoaring](https://twitter.com/bluesoaring) and tumblr [bluesoaring](https://bluesoaring.tumblr.com/).


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